Access control systems are designed to provide access to areas of a facility for individuals who are authorized to access such areas, and deny access to those areas of the facility to individuals who are not authorized to access such areas. For example, certain individuals may be authorized to access a secure area of a facility, whereas other individuals may not be allowed to access the secure area.
Previous approaches to access control systems may use physical access cards. Carrying a physical access card may be cumbersome. A user may be locked out of an area if the user forgets to carry the physical access card, and an unauthorized user may gain access to a secure area because the access control system cannot verify the physical identity of the user carrying the physical access card.
Additionally, previous approaches may not link an access control system with a physical access card to track the card within the facility in that the physical access card may be disconnected from the system until the user manually displays the card to an access reader, for instance. Moreover, a person may not use the card (intentionally or unintentionally) and gain access to an area of a facility by following another person in.